devoted to this painful subject. On the contrary, no definite idea can
be formed as to the character of the Netherland revolt without a thorough
understanding of this great cause--the religious persecution in which the
country had lived, breathed, and had its being, for half a century, and
in which, had the rebellion not broken out at last, the population must
have been either exterminated or entirely embruted. The few years which
are immediately to occupy us in the present and succeeding chapter,
present the country in a daily increasing ferment from the action of
causes which had existed long before, but which received an additional
stimulus as the policy of the new reign developed itself.

Previously to the accession of Charles V., it can not be said that an
inquisition had ever been established in the provinces. Isolated
instances to the contrary, adduced by the canonists who gave their advice
to Margaret of Parma, rather proved the absence than the existence of the
system. In the reign of Philip the Good, the vicar of the inquisitor-
general gave sentence against some heretics, who were burned in Lille
(1448). In 1459, Pierre Troussart, a Jacobin monk, condemned many
Waldenses, together with some leading citizens of Artois, accused of
sorcery and heresy. He did this, however, as inquisitor for the Bishop
of Arras, so that it was an act of episcopal, and not papal inquisition.
In general, when inquisitors were wanted in the provinces, it was
necessary to borrow them from France or Germany. The exigencies of
persecution making a domestic staff desirable, Charles the Fifth, in the
year 1522, applied to his ancient tutor, whom he had placed on the papal
throne.

Charles had, however, already, in the previous year appointed Francis Van
der Hulst to be inquisitor-general for the Netherlands. This man, whom
Erasmus called a "wonderful enemy to learning," was also provided with a